From the Ruins of Nosis
by VinnyLB
Summary: The Nosis has been destroyed, and Doctor Selig appears to be dead. But has Zeta really lost his last chance for freedom? Chapter 3 is finished!
1. New Orders

From the Ruins of Nosis

(fan fiction version)

by Vanessa

A/N: I'm baaack... (Cue scary music!) After a very, very long hiatus, I'm finally going to start on my big TZP fan fic, formerly titled "Final Gift." And, once I get back in the habit of drawing Zee and Ro, this fic will possibly be a web comic!

Disclaimer: The Zeta Project will never belong to me, no matter how much I beg. It was created by Robert Goodman, but is currently owned by Warner Brothers, which wouldn't know a good cartoon series if it slapped them in the face.

Chapter One: New Orders

The sun was setting over the ocean, casting its dying light across the calm surface of the water. Every few minutes, she could see a bright flash as the sun's light hit something metallic, and every time, she would look away. But the sight of the depressed synthoid sitting beside her in the escape pod was, in many ways, far more sad than the scattered wreckage below.

Infiltration Unit Zeta stared down at the pocketwatch in his hand, a lost look on his holographic face. "He's gone, Ro. Now no one will ever believe me."

Ro smiled slightly and reached out to take his hand, trying to transfer some of her optimism to him. "Don't worry, Zee. We'll find a way." She sounded convincing enough, but would it be enough to console him? She doubted it... "For now," she muttered, sitting back in her seat, "let's just focus on getting out of here without the feds noticing."

Zeta nodded almost imperceptibly, closing his hand over the watch and turning his gaze toward the stretch of land in the distance. He didn't say anything, but the next question was obvious.

Now that Selig was dead, where were they running?

Titus Sweete regarded his captors with a satisfied smirk. Nothing he told his two interrogators would matter now. Brothers' Day had completed its most important mission, and Eli Selig, the leading scientist responsible for the creation of synthoids, was dead. As much as he had hoped to avoid prison, it was a small price to pay for such a tremendous victory.

Yet, he couldn't help but wonder what these two agents wanted from him now. He had already explained Brothers' Day's objective; too late for them to do anything about it _now_, right? So why did Colonel Lomak and Agent James Bennet look at him as if he had something more to tell? It was unnerving.

Bennet stared at him for a moment from across the wide metal table. "I mentioned this on the Nosis, Sweete," he finally said, "and I'm going to ask you again. I expect you to cooperate this time. We have proof that the synthoid was on your submarine, disguised as Doctor Selig. We know he boarded the Nosis with your team. Was the synthoid a part of this mission? Did you, or did you not, manipulate him into disobeying his original program?"

"Is that what this is about?" The smirk didn't leave Sweete's face. "One of your synthoids went awol, and you wanna blame it on my group, is that it? Not my problem. I told you, I don't _do_ synthoids, for exactly that reason. A human betrays you..." He held up his index finger, pointing it to his temple, pantomiming a gun to his head. "Bang. Not a problem anymore. But a synthoid... You make 'em too advanced, give 'em too much free will. Make 'em more like a human with superpowers. You even called that thing '_him._' But when one of those things betrays you... not that easy to take care of, is it?"

Lomak frowned. "Then Brothers' Day didn't reprogram IU Zeta."

"Brothers' Day hasn't even _heard_ of IU Zeta till now. And even if we knew how to reprogram your synthoids, why would we use the same methods we're tryin' to put a stop to? It would be in our best interest to just destroy the damn thing. We stand by our objectives. We ain't hypocrites."

"Of course not. You're a traitor to your country and a mass murderer, but Heaven forbid you should be guilty of _hypocrisy_." Bennet scowled and stood up. "Tell me, Sweete... Do you remember Eugene Dolan?"

"Dolan?" He seemed lost in thought for a moment. "Yeah, Dolan. That's a name I ain't heard in a long time. What about him?"

"We know he was involved with Brothers' Day."

To their surprise, Sweete laughed out loud. "You kiddin'? That guy wouldn't hurt a fly. Had no idea who he was workin' for. He was startin' to get nosey, so we dropped him a few years ago, went with another accountant." His eyes narrowed, and he leaned forward slightly. "...What does this have to do with Eugene Dolan?"

Lomak glanced at Bennet. Despite these new revelations, the agent's expression remained impassive, unreadable. It was as if he knew everything Sweete was going to say before he said it.

"That will be all." This was not directed at Sweete, but to the two heavily armed officers standing behind the table. Lomak waited until they had pulled the criminal to his feet and from the room before he spoke again. "Well... What do you think, Jim?"

Bennet was silent for a moment, slowly considering his words. "Zeta has been saying all along that he chose not to eliminate Dolan, because the man was innocent. Just because Zeta was telling the truth about that... That alone wouldn't be enough to prove his innocence. But taking into consideration what we've learned from Sweete, and what Selig said on the Nosis..."

Lomak sighed, lowering himself into a chair and resting his chin on his folded hands. "This changes everything."

"Yes, sir."

"Let's not waste any time, then. You have your orders. Retrieve the synthoid and Miss Rowen, and bring them to me."

The NSA hovervan, with all of its high-tech equipment specifically designed to capture Zeta, was out of the question this time. The new mission required Bennet to keep a lower profile than before, so he opted for a smaller, more inconspicuous black hovercar. The new vehicle was equipped with only a small computer, and certainly didn't provide enough room for a full team of agents. Even West and Rush were staying behind this time. Bennet shuddered to think of how West would mess this one up.

He slid into the car, immediately studying the information on the computer, his only link back to Lomak. Currently, the only information it could provide was the last location at which Zeta had used his unlimited cred card. He had not gone far, Bennet noted with a frown. It was almost as if he didn't want to run anymore.

And, really, where could the synthoid and the girl run now? Bennet remembered the first time Zeta had contacted him after his rebellion, begging him to listen, desperately trying to convince him that the choice he made was of his own free will. And now he understood Zeta's reasoning: if the NSA, the people who commanded him, wouldn't listen, maybe the person who built him would. That was why he was stalking Eli Selig.

But Selig was dead now, lost at the bottom of the ocean with all his research and all Zeta's hopes and answers. With his creator gone, Zeta must have thought that his entire journey had been in vain. That no one would ever believe him now.

Zeta was wrong.

Next: Chapter Two, "Hope Rises"


	2. Hope Rises

From the Ruins of Nosis

by Vanessa

A/N: Thanks for all the reviews!

Dragoncat: Nothing _ever_ comes easily for Zee and Ro, does it? This story will have a lot more conflict than any of my older fics.

Optimus Magnus: Did TZP just start airing in your area, or did you get the taped episodes? It's been two years, and this series continues to attract new fans. If only WB would notice...

Iglika: Coming from you, that's a big compliment! My theory about Doctor Selig that I use in this fic is completely different now that I've read "You Need Me."

TZP dude: This reference you keep making to a site... Are you talking about The ZeeRo Project? If so, I _am_ working on a new version of it, and I hope to have it up in a few months.

Disclaimer: Robert Goodman created The Zeta Project, I'm just borrowing them for my idea of how the series might end.

Chapter Two: Hope Rises

Ro Rowen hesitantly stepped out of the bathroom, attempting to dry her hair with an already soaked towel. It had been difficult to wash away the ash and saltwater, and impossible to forget everything that had happened that day. Anxiety had been plaguing her the entire time she was away from Zee; would he leave her as soon as her back was turned?

It was an immense relief to see that Zeta was still in the hotel room, still sitting motionlessly at the foot of the small bed. He didn't look up when she walked back into the room, but stared out the window as if he didn't hear her return at all. And he still clutched Selig's pocketwatch tightly, as if clinging to his memory.

Her heart immediately went out to him. She stepped closer to the bed, studying his holographic face. In the two years she had been with him, she had learned that he was more than a machine. Zeta, she mused, had always seemed more like a human who had the misfortune of being born into a synthoid's body. He wasn't just a robot with a conscience module; he was a tin man with a soul, with feelings, and with no way to express them.

Ro hesitantly reached out to place her hand over his cheek, feeling it pass through the semi-solid hologram to the cool metal frame below. That got his attention. Such a gesture was uncommon for the invulnerable Rosalie Rowen.

Her eyes met his, and his look of surprise slowly reverted to one of hopelessness, his eyes lowering and his brow furrowing in a very human display of sadness. His pale blue eyes seemed distant, and Ro knew that if it were possible, he would be crying now. True, he could easily alter his hologram to produce the illusion of tears, but that's all it would be. An illusion. Fake. And she knew that Zee hated faking his humanity far more than he hated his inability to cry.

"Zee," she whispered. Her hand slipped from his face to his shoulder, and she leaned forward, throwing her other arm around him in a tight hug. He hesitated, then slowly returned the gesture, resting his chin on top of her head. "Don't give up on me now, okay, Zee?" she muttered against his chest. "You've still got me. And I'm not going anywhere."

No. Ro wasn't going anywhere. Throughout their entire journey, he had tried many times to convince her to stay behind. It wasn't safe for her to be on the run from the government with a killer robot, he had tried to tell her, usually after she had suffered from some injury on his behalf. But Ro wouldn't hear it, and only a few months ago, he had come to understand why.

The NSA, he recalled, had tried to erase his memories, and in doing so, they reawakened the killer robot he had been before his experiences changed him. He had been stalking the halls of their headquarters, looking for the next target to eliminate, when he heard a voice... and then nothing else mattered to him but finding the source of those words:

"How many nights has he put a roof over _your_ head, made sure _you_ were safe, and warm, and had food to eat? I'm alive because of _him_!"

And that voice had saved him.

Ro was alive because of him.

He was alive because of Ro.

Nothing would make him leave her behind now. She was all he had left in the world. Somehow, that thought comforted him. No matter what happened, he would always have her. The ghost of a smile flickered across his face.

He could have stayed there forever, holding her, ignoring everything else around them. When she was there with him, so close, nothing else seemed to matter. He wasn't worried about the NSA agents tracking them down. He wasn't quite as angry at Brothers' Day; staying with Ro right now was more important than any sudden need for justice or vengeance. And if it were possible, he was even... a little less sad about the loss of Doctor Selig. Just a little.

When she began to relax against him, though, he was reminded that this had been a long, difficult day for both of them, and Ro needed rest. Zeta pulled back reluctantly, still smiling. "Get some sleep, Ro," he said softly. "We're going to start moving again in the morning. I... I don't know where we're running anymore, but..."

"We just have to keep running," she finished for him. "That's the important thing, right?"

"Right." He smiled as she fell back against the bed, burying her face in the pillow and closing her eyes.

"Don't go anywhere without me, tin man. I mean it."

"I will never leave you," he said quietly, his voice barely above a whisper. Several seconds passed with no reply; his exhausted accomplice was already asleep. Zeta sat there at the foot of her bed, watching over her and reviewing their conversation.

Selig was the only one who had known about the conscience module. The only one who could have told the government the truth. With him gone, there didn't seem to be much hope for them at all, and yet... after talking to Ro, Zee began to feel new optimism. It was such an illogical hope that this girl had given him.

But then, none of the things she had been making him feel lately were logical.

The last of the sun's light was slipping below the horizon, sinking into the dark water, when the synthoid's damaged hand finally emerged from the ruins of Nosis. The instant the cool air hit the damaged circuitry, thousands of tiny devices set to work repairing the missing patches of synthetic skin, a new technology made possible by Doctor Selig's cellular regeneration research.

The fingers flexed experimentally, both checking for malfunctions and searching for something to hold onto, something to pull it to the surface. Normally, the synthoid would have had no difficulty swimming to the surface on its own; dragging along an injured man made this harder.

Finally, the hand found a scrap of floating wreckage large enough to hold him. All of its superhuman strength went into keeping itself afloat while lifting the man from the water onto the makeshift raft. He was fortunately still alive, but in bad condition, having hit his head when the escape pod was shut down. He was unconscious, and the synthoid knew that it was possible that he might have a concussion.

Even now, even after all the effort put into rescuing him, time was running out. Doctor Selig had to make it to a hospital.

Ro awoke the next morning to find that Zee was gone. Her initial panic faded when she discovered the note he had left, assuring her that he had just gone out for supplies for the journey– dry clothes, food for Ro, things like that– and he would be back shortly. "You looked so peaceful," the note read, "and I know you needed sleep, so I didn't want to disturb you." She smiled, almost able to hear his apologetic voice.

An hour passed with no word from Zee. Ro began to get restless, pacing around the small hotel room, trying to find something to keep her mind off what might be wrong. She truly believed what Zee and his note both promised, that he wasn't going to leave her behind, but... What if he had been captured? There was no way the NSA _didn't_ know by now that they had boarded the Nosis with Brothers' Day. How long would it take them to send Bennet and his team?

"Don't go out," the note warned. "Stay inside and wait for me. I promise I'll come back soon."

She obeyed the note until she couldn't stand it anymore. If Zee was in trouble, she was going to help him whether he liked it or not. She picked her holoprojector up from the small table by the bed, clasping it onto her wrist, and ran towards the door.

Before she reached it, however, the door flew open. She took a step back, startled, as Zeta dashed into the room, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her toward the window. "It's Bennet," he told her, his voice low. "He knows we're here!"

She allowed herself to be pulled closer as he cut through the glass, didn't even argue when he leapt with her from the window, despite the fact that they were on the fourth floor, and she had a paralyzing fear of heights. His hand shot out to grab the ledge of a nearby building, lowering them both safely to the ground.

The NSA van was nowhere to be seen. There was no team of armed agents waiting outside to ambush them. Ro wondered for a moment if Zee had been mistaken... but Zee rarely made mistakes. Well... not when it came to things like this, anyway.

"I was coming back with the supplies," he said, as if in response to her unspoken question, "and I saw him in the lobby. He was obviously asking people about us. I tried to sneak past him, but he saw me, and followed me. He's probably searching the hotel rooms for us right n–"

This time, Zeta _was_ wrong. Bennet had assumed that they would escape through the window, and that following him back to the hotel room was therefore a lost cause. Just as Ro was beginning to wonder where all the agents were, he burst through the hotel's front door. "Zeta, wait!"

Not "Freeze," or "Don't move, Zeta!" Just "wait." That in itself was strange. Even more odd was the fact that Bennet didn't appear to be armed; he was well within range to throw an EMP device or containment shell, or at least to shoot at them. But he didn't. He didn't even try to approach them.

Zeta, despite this highly unusual situation, had no intention to "wait." He took Ro's hand and pulled her forward, spinning on his heel and running as quickly as she could keep up. Behind them, he could hear Bennet mutter something under his breath, then he, too, was running. "Zeta, please listen to me!"

He had only heard that tone in the agent's voice once before, when he had learned that his son was trapped in a submarine with Ro. It was a desperate tone, one that had proven to the synthoid that, whatever else he was, James Bennet was a good man. He almost stopped running.

Their chase had attracted a rather large crowd, and Zeta used this to his advantage. Still holding Ro's hand, he holomorphed both of them, darting into the large group of people, constantly changing their disguises so that soon, no one knew who they were, or where they had gone. Zeta slowed his pace to a quick walk, and they became just another middle-aged couple trying to get through the crowd. Bennet, without his various containment devices or his hologram-filtering binoculars, couldn't tell them apart from anyone else.

He wasn't one to give up so easily, however. He ran through the mass of bystanders, "accidently" bumping into people in order to test their solidity, all while calling out "Zeta! Miss Rowen!" Several people regarded him with looks of confusion or annoyance. Zeta and Ro avoided his searching gaze completely.

"Where are the others?" Ro whispered. "Doesn't it seem strange that West and Rush aren't with him? And why doesn't he have any weapons? I mean, not that I mind, but..."

"I don't understand it either. But if Bennet knows we're here, he must know we had something to do with the destruction of Nosis. Keep walking, Ro. We have to get out of this city."

Bennet was getting entirely too close to them. Ro glanced back at him and saw the desperation written clearly across his face, heard him continue to call out to them. She walked a little faster.

"Zeta! Miss Rowen!" There was a long pause, and then, more hesitantly...

"Zee! Ro!"

Zeta froze.

Next: Chapter three, "Mission Complete"

New fic: "The Call"

Currently writing: "From the Ruins of Nosis"

"Remembering Zee"


	3. Mission Complete

From the Ruins of Nosis

by Vanessa

Chapter 3: Mission Complete

"Zee, what are you doing! Come on, we have to get out of here!"

Zeta didn't move.

Zee. Bennet had called him Zee. Not once during their two-year chase had the agent called him by this nickname, his human name, the name he had come to accept as his own. To the NSA, he was the synthoid, the IU, Zeta. Never Zee. And Ro was Rosalie, or Miss Rowen, the runaway juvenile delinquent, the accomplice. Something was very wrong, and Zeta's curiosity demanded to know what it was before he took another step.

Bennet's gaze swept over the dissipating crowd of spectators, before finally stopping on them. They were the only couple not moving, the only ones staring at him so intently, as if they knew who he was and why he was there. Slowly, he took a step forward, raising his arms over his head to prove he wasn't armed.

"Zeta?"

The synthoid said nothing, neither confirming nor denying his identity. Bennet took a step closer. "Don't run, Zeta. I'm just here to talk to you. That's what you wanted, right? To talk to me?"

"Zee!" Ro hissed. "He knows who we are! We have to run, now!"

"He just wants to talk..."

"Remember how your _last_ 'talk' with Bennet went! He almost erased your brain! Reprogrammed you! How is _this_ time any different!"

"It _is_ different. Somehow, _Bennet _is different."

She frowned. Bennet was coming closer, and escape now seemed unlikely. "I hope you're right about this, Zee..."

Cautiously, Bennet stepped in front of them. "I don't want to reprogram you," he began softly, not wanting to alert the civilians to the presence of a "killer robot." Clearly, he had also anticipated Ro's suspicion. "That's not why I'm here. Not this time. I just want to talk to you– to _both_ of you."

This, too, was unusual. In the past, the NSA had taken measures to keep the two fugitives separate, to prevent them from helping one another. And now he wanted both of them, together? The whole situation felt like a trap, Ro thought, glaring at Bennet and wishing she could read the true intentions behind his stoic expression.

"...But not here," the man continued. "Too many civilians around."

Ro was convinced that she had him figured out now. This was obviously a trap! Anyone could see that! He would lead them back to the NSA's hovervan, where all the weaponry and agents were waiting. They would have Zee right where they wanted him, and then–

"What about over there?" Zee gestured to a Ground Wire across the street. Ro turned her glare on him as if to ask what in the world he thought he was doing. Under normal circumstances, he would never willingly follow Bennet. But she knew that the agent had appealed to something stronger than Zeta's sense of self-preservation– his sense of curiosity. She had to admit, she also wanted the full story behind the strange behavior of their would-be captor, and she felt better when Bennet allowed Zee to choose the location.

Zeta was not as reckless as Ro imagined. He stepped into the brightly-colored building fully expecting an ambush, ready to scan the area for the familiar faces of Bennet's team. He might have felt less uneasy had there actually been agents waiting for them; the Ground Wire was almost completely deserted.

They took their seats in a back corner of the cyber café. Only when they were far away from the other customers did Zeta feel it was safe to speak again. "Agent Bennet," he began, his voice low, "you took a great risk, coming here to capture me without assistance. Where is the rest of your team?"

"I _am_ the team," Bennet answered without hesitation. "And I meant it when I said that I only came here to speak to you. Please, listen to me, Zeta. After you hear what I have to say... then we can move on to the next stage of this mission."

"Mission?" Ro asked skeptically.

Bennet nodded. "I'll admit, the original orders for my team were 'to retrieve the synthoid, IU Zeta, in functioning condition, and deliver it to the nearest NSA facility for reprogramming and reassignment.' In other words, to capture you, erase your memory, and put you back to work as our weapon."

"Which you almost succeeded in doing," Zeta added.

"So you think this new plan of yours is going to work?" Ro sneered. "Zee got away from your guys once. He can do it again!" Still, the question plagued her: why would the NSA want Bennet to _tell_ them about the new mission?

Bennet cast an exasperated look at the girl, then wisely chose to tune her out. "Yes, we almost succeeded, and in the end, we failed miserably. We didn't know anything about you at that time. We were trying to repair technology that we couldn't even begin to understand."

"You can't repair what isn't broken," Ro muttered, annoyed at being ignored.

"But then, the NSA made a discovery that changed everything." Bennet's voice dropped lower. "We have proof that you were on the submarine with Brothers' Day, disguised as your own creator."

Zeta looked horrified. Since Selig's death, this very conversation had become his worst nightmare. He was being accused of killing Selig. Of murdering the man he considered his father. And he could provide no proof that would clear his name. It was his word against the NSA's evidence. "I... I didn't..."

But Bennet went on without listening. "We also know that, while Brothers' Day faked the submarine's destruction, the two of you went ahead to Nosis. But why? To lower the lab's defenses? To find Selig and eliminate him on your own? To us, these were the most logical possibilities." He paused. "But Titus Sweete denied every possibility we could name. Until we questioned him about your involvement, he had never even heard of you."

"That's what we've been trying to tell you all along!" Ro leapt out of her seat, not even trying to keep a low profile anymore. After attracting startled and confused glances from the other customers, she lowered her voice again. "Zee's not working for the terrorists. He was just-"

"Trying to find Selig. Yes, I know that now." Bennet sighed, leaning back in his seat at the computer. "We have one more piece of evidence in your favor, Zeta. You see... I was also on the Nosis, looking for you. And when you found Selig... I found you. I heard everything. I know everything about you now. About why you ran. The NSA knows it, too. That's why they cancelled the former mission, to capture and reprogram you."

Ro gasped, and Zeta's eyes widened. The agent's solemn expression finally broke into a slight smile at their reaction. "You don't have to take my word for it," he said, leaning towards the computer and accessing the NSA's database. "See for yourself."

Seconds later, the new orders appeared on the screen, issued by someone named "Lomak." The robot and the girl peered over his shoulder, reading the objective of the team's sole member, Agent James Bennet:

"_Retrieve Infiltration Unit Zeta and accomplice Rosalie Rowen and deliver them unharmed to NSA HQ for debriefing."_

Zeta could only stare blankly at the screen.

"Debriefing," Ro whispered. "That means..."

"It means that the government wants Zeta to return to headquarters, where after a brief hearing, he will be relieved of his duties as an Infiltration Unit. In other words-"

"My freedom," Zeta whispered in awe. "I've finally won my freedom."

Next: Chapter Four, "Too Good to be True"

See my profile for the link to my new site, TZP: Nosis.


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